The ''Mariner'' class was a class of six 8-gun

gunvessel A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies. History Pre-stea ...

s (

sloops A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular ...

from 1884) built for the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

between 1883 and 1888. Four were built in the Naval Dockard at Devonport, and two elsewhere; the ''Acorn'' was built by contract at Jacobs Pill on the Pembroke River (a private yard founded in the 1870s by Sir Edward Reed), while the ''Melita'' was built in the

Malta Dockyard Malta Dockyard was an important naval base in the Grand Harbour in Malta in the Mediterranean Sea. The infrastructure which is still in operation is now operated by Palumbo Shipyards. History Pre-1800 The Knights of Malta established dockyard ...

, the only substantial ship of the Royal Navy ever to be built in the island.

Construction

Design

Nathaniel Barnaby Sir Nathaniel Barnaby, (25 February 1829 – 16 June 1915) was Chief Constructor of the Royal Navy from 1872 to 1885. Biography Born on 25 February 1829 in Chatham, Barnaby began his career as a naval apprentice at Sheerness in 1843. He won ...

,Winfield (2004), p.296 the Royal Navy

Director of Naval Construction The Director of Naval Construction (DNC) also known as the Department of the Director of Naval Construction and Directorate of Naval Construction and originally known as the Chief Constructor of the Navy was a senior principal civil officer resp ...

, the hull was of composite construction; that is, iron keel, frames, stem and stern posts with wooden planking. The entire class were re-classified in November 1884 as

before they entered service.

Propulsion

Propulsion was provided by a 2-cylinder horizontal compound-expansion steam engine of driving a single screw. This arrangement provided enough power to drive the ships at , although ''Icarus'' and ''Melita'' recorded 12.5 knots.

Sail plan

All the ships of the class were built as

barque A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts having the fore- and mainmasts rigged square and only the mizzen (the aftmost mast) rigged fore and aft. Sometimes, the mizzen is only partly fore-and-aft rigged, b ...

-rigged vessels, except ''Icarus'', which had no main yards provided, making her a

barquentine A barquentine or schooner barque (alternatively "barkentine" or "schooner bark") is a sailing vessel with three or more masts; with a square rigged foremast and fore-and-aft rigged main, mizzen and any other masts. Modern barquentine sailing ...

Armament

The class was designed and built to carry eight 5-inch 38cwt breech-loading guns,"5-inch" refers to the

calibre In guns, particularly firearms, caliber (or calibre; sometimes abbreviated as "cal") is the specified nominal internal diameter of the gun barrel bore – regardless of how or where the bore is measured and whether the finished bore match ...

of the gun; 38cwt is the weight of the gun in

hundredweight The hundredweight (abbreviation: cwt), formerly also known as the centum weight or quintal, is a British imperial and US customary unit of weight or mass. Its value differs between the US and British imperial systems. The two values are distingu ...

. one light gun and eight machine guns. ''Melita'' had 40cwt guns instead of 38cwt, and ''Reindeer'' had two of her guns removed.

Construction

All the ships were laid down in 1882-83. While most of the ships were completed relatively quickly, ''Melita'' took six years to build. The intention behind building her at Malta was to make use of the substantial workforce at

who were otherwise (it was felt) unemployed when the Mediterranean Fleet was away. The experiment cost £10,000 more than the British-built versions, and incurred substantial delay; it was not repeated, and ''Melita'' remained the only warship of any significant size ever built in Malta for the Royal Navy.Preston (2007), p.178.

Ships

Notes

References

* * * {{Mariner class gunvessel Gunboat classes Mariner

Construction

Design

Propulsion

Sail plan

Armament

Construction

Ships

See also

Notes

References